In Past Show

In the Mortifications series, a realistic model of a nude figurine is digitally "mutilated" and subjected to irregular and apparently organic deformations. By creating forms that evoke decay out of aluminum and non-biodegradable ABS plastic, using a process intended to produce prototypes for mass production, the Mortifications propose a digital Baroque. Related to the intentions of the historical Baroque, the emotionally expressive, personal style of this imagery is intended to breathe irregularity and life into a conformist techno/consumer culture.

To create this work, an individual 3D computer model is first produced by Hart in a way that is typical of industrial manufacture but then further developed using other techicques from classical art production, thereby creating an unusual hybrid. To make this "Mortification" Hart has employed the "lost wax" process. She has produced a mold of the Rapid Prototype ABT plastic master. A unique sculpture is then produced by pouring molten aluminum into the mold and in so doing, burning out the ABT plastic prototype, leaving only this unique, solid aluminum piece.

About Claudia Hart

Claudia Hart’s works juxtapose the futuristic and the classical, combining 3-D animation software with such canonical images as the nude female form and still lifes of apples. Hart presents themes of death and the inevitable ravages of time, offset by a vision of an alternate technological universe in which plastic bodies elude decay. Though patently artificial, the figures in Hart’s film installations emote in a recognizably human way as they are put through often agonizing processes involving containment and atrophy. For the series “PhotoMortifications” (2007-2009), Hart superimposed 3-D images of decomposing statues on to photographs of large modern public interiors. In a similar interplay between artifice and authenticity, “The Real and the Fake” (2011) features photographed edibles of questionable nutritional value with computer-generated images of flawless apples, inspired by the decline in the quality of food.